It looks like driverless cars are becoming a mainstay in Los Angeles.
Waymo, the autonomous vehicle company based in Mountain View, is now open for business in Los Angeles County.
The Alphabet-owned company first began navigating the streets of Phoenix and Tempe in Arizona in 2020 before opening in San Francisco earlier in June. But Los Angeles is a rather daunting beast – Waymo’s move to the area marks the company’s largest city in which its robotaxis operate.
“Our service has matured quickly and our riders are embracing the many benefits of fully autonomous driving,” Tekedra Mawakana, the co-chief executive of Waymo, said in a statement.
Indeed, some women have indicated they prefer taking driverless vehicles over ride share vehicles due to safety concerns. But these cars are still in their infancy, and there is a catch: Waymo can only operate on surface streets and cannot cut through the expansive highways that are a mainstay for Los Angeles commuters.
“Waymo takes a gradual and incremental approach to scaling our service in all of the cities that we currently operate in,” said Anjelica Price-Rocha, a spokesperson for Waymo. “In L.A., as with our other markets, this involves close collaboration with local law enforcement, regulators and community groups. Our vehicles are designed to handle any situation with safety in mind, and this includes navigating L.A.’s sprawling roadways.”
The company has quietly been testing its driverless cars in Los Angeles for several months. In March, Waymo One rolled out to select customers between Santa Monica and downtown Los Angeles and accumulated around 50,000 people on its waitlist in the city. Last year, in October 2023, the company hosted a “Waymo One Tour” that allowed users to experience its vehicles for the first time. The company said Los Angeles residents had taken over 15,000 rides during its incubation period and accumulated around 300,000 people on its waitlist.
Now, using the Waymo One mobile app, users can hail a Waymo vehicle within 79 square miles of Los Angeles County.
“Removing the waitlist in L.A. followed a steady progression of introducing our service to Angelenos and ultimately bringing a paid service here earlier this year…we’ve met the product readiness and safety standards to deploy our fleet for commercial ride-hailing across L.A. Opening up our full service here was a natural next step in our expansion,” Price-Rocha said.
California is becoming increasingly friendly to autonomous vehicles. Three bills regarding driverless vehicles made their way to Gov. Gavin Newsom’s desk this year, and he vetoed two: one that would ban autonomous trucks from operating on public roads, and another that would require stricter data reporting from autonomous vehicle companies.
Waymo isn’t the only autonomous vehicle company interested in conquering the sprawling, daunting and confusing streets of Los Angeles. Serve Robotics, a Silicon Valley robot delivery vehicle, operates exclusively in parts of Los Angeles.
“I think L.A. is actually quite representative of all the challenges you could face anywhere you go,” Serve robotics chief executive Ali Kashani said.
Combined, riders in the metro Phoenix area, San Francisco and Los Angeles have taken over 150,000 rides per week via Waymo One.
